Speaker 1: Col Zone media.
Speaker 2: In the last few weeks, indeed the last few months,
Speaker 2: the eyes of the world have been on the trusties
Speaker 2: afflicted on the people of Palestine on a daily basis.
Speaker 2: For the first time in most of our lifetimes, tens
Speaker 2: of thousands of people have taken to the streets to
Speaker 2: lift their voices for a stateless station of Palestine and
Speaker 2: against Israel's un checked mass murder of civilians. It's something
Speaker 2: I never thought I would see in the US, and
Speaker 2: one of my first visits here, I was staying at
Speaker 2: a bed and breakfast in the Bronx in late December.
Speaker 2: It was cold and I was wearing a kafir to
Speaker 2: stay warm, as I still often do. I remember wearing
Speaker 2: it while I was talking to small guys while I
Speaker 2: was waiting for the train, and we talked about Palestine
Speaker 2: for a long time. I ended up giving one of
Speaker 2: them my kafir and he gave me some cool badgets,
Speaker 2: so I still have one jacket somewhere. I was hopeful
Speaker 2: after that, but since then I've lived here for more
Speaker 2: than a decade. It was really not for about fifteen
Speaker 2: years that I saw someone else in the US without
Speaker 2: a direct connection to Palestine who wanted to show up
Speaker 2: for the Palestinians. It's an important cause and it's one
Speaker 2: that we've been supporting here on our podcast with our
Speaker 2: coverage and speaking for myself also with my presence when
Speaker 2: I can. But as the world looked at Gaza, bombs
Speaker 2: also fell on Kurdistan. It's equally hard, if not harder,
Speaker 2: to find solidarity for the Kurdish freedom movement in the
Speaker 2: United States. I have a Kurdish kafir as well. A
Speaker 2: Kurdish migrant there met in the mountains gave it to
Speaker 2: me on one cold night last year after I said
Speaker 2: good evening to him in Comanche. Stinks of campfires and
Speaker 2: cigarettes and I wearried all the time. I don't think
Speaker 2: anyone has ever recognized it, let alone said anything positive
Speaker 2: about it. But someone did once ask me if it
Speaker 2: was a rasped thing. So while our eyes have been
Speaker 2: on Gaza, those of Turkish drones and warplanes have been
Speaker 2: on the mountains of southern Kurdistan. Bombs have been going
Speaker 2: off in kurdis Dine for a very long time. Indeed,
Speaker 2: before Gernica, Britain was dropping bombs on people in the
Speaker 2: Middle East without paintings to commemorate it. State boundaries and
Speaker 2: alliances have changed a lot since those first poems, as
Speaker 2: has technology, but the fact that death from above has
Speaker 2: remained a consistent tool of the colonial state hasn't changed.
Speaker 2: When I was in kurdis Dan in October twenty twenty three,
Speaker 2: it was amidst almost constant drone strikes. I had to
Speaker 2: conduct my interviews in a climate of secrecy and concern,
Speaker 2: somewhat for my own safety, but also for the safety
Speaker 2: of my interviewees, who took great and serious personal risks
Speaker 2: to come and meet me. One of the people I
Speaker 2: met was Zagros Heuer, a spokesman for the kurdis Dan
Speaker 2: Communities Union or in Kurdish Koma sivakn Kurdistdani, it's generally
Speaker 2: known as the KSEK by its Curtis initials. Recently I
Speaker 2: connected with Zagros again and I asked him to explain
Speaker 2: this latest round of aggression.
Speaker 3: Hello, dear James, I hope you're doing well.
Speaker 4: As far as your first question is concerned, I can
Speaker 4: say that this operation has started from sixteenth of April,
Speaker 4: six days before advanced visit to Baghdad, and in the
Speaker 4: last weeks the Tekish Army has extended these operations and
Speaker 4: this invading army has moved further deep into the Iraqi
Speaker 4: territory and the Kurdistan region. Now they have set up checkpoints,
Speaker 4: they stop civilians, they interrogate them. According to CPT report,
Speaker 4: CPT stands for Community Community Peace Making Teams.
Speaker 3: It is.
Speaker 4: A civil society organization active in Iraq and Kurdistan Region
Speaker 4: of Iraq. According to CPT report, in the last months,
Speaker 4: there has been two hundred thirty eight bombardments in those
Speaker 4: areas and the two thousand hectares of agricultural land have
Speaker 4: been burned to ashes. And now six hundred two villages
Speaker 4: are under the threat of displacement and one hundred and
Speaker 4: sixty two of them have already been displaced.
Speaker 3: They have been raised to earth. From the start of this.
Speaker 4: Year, according to CPP data, oney seven hundred attacks have
Speaker 4: been have been done and this comes against the backdrop
Speaker 4: of attacks in twenty twenty three where one thy five
Speaker 4: hundred forty eight bombardments have taken place.
Speaker 2: If you're not familiar with the KCK on his behalfs
Speaker 2: are Grossi speaking, you can think of it as the
Speaker 2: umbrella group that unites various Kurdish freedom movements in Bakur
Speaker 2: north but Sure or south or west, and Rodulat or east,
Speaker 2: to use the Kurdish terms. These parts of the Kurdish
Speaker 2: homeland are found in different states respectively. They are in Turkey, Iraq, Syria,
Speaker 2: and Iran. In each of these states, Kurdish people represent
Speaker 2: a minority. Under the Assad regime. In Syria, Syrian Kurds
Speaker 2: were stripped of their citizenship and forced out of their
Speaker 2: homes and what is known as the Arab Belt program.
Speaker 2: In Turkey, they've been bombed, banned from speaking their language,
Speaker 2: and even have their very existence denied by the state.
Speaker 2: In Iran, tens of thousands of Kurds were killed when
Speaker 2: they rose up for autonomy in nineteen seventy nine, and
Speaker 2: they still cannot teach their children in their own language.
Speaker 2: In Iraq, they were subjected to genocidal violence, chemical weapons,
Speaker 2: and the murder enforced Arabization of tens of thousands of
Speaker 2: Kurds during what is known as the Anfhal. If you
Speaker 2: ever find yourself in Sulomania or Slomani as it's known
Speaker 2: in Kurdish, you can visit the Incredible Museum there, which
Speaker 2: documents the tortured history of the Kurdish people at the
Speaker 2: hands of the Iraqi state. It's a very moving place.
Speaker 2: On entering the museum, you'll walk through a hallway that's
Speaker 2: covered from floor to ceiling with broken pieces of mirrors.
Speaker 2: Each represents a life cut short during the anph After
Speaker 2: this entrance, the first exhibit you'll see has a large
Speaker 2: sign that says, in those days, we had no friends
Speaker 2: but the mountains. It's an old and sometimes overused aphorism
Speaker 2: about the Kurds, but it's not untrue. In the mountains
Speaker 2: of southern Kurdistan. The Kurdistan Freedom Movement aims to liberate
Speaker 2: the Kurdish people from all four states, and indeed from
Speaker 2: the state altogether, and it's in these mountains that's found
Speaker 2: a place where it could avoid state violence. The mountains
Speaker 2: of Kurdistan have long provided a safe place, and especially
Speaker 2: in recent years, the mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan controlled by
Speaker 2: Baffet Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan which shares power in
Speaker 2: the Kurdistan Autonomous Region of Iraq with the Kurdistan Democratic
Speaker 2: Party headed by Musud Barzani. The Kurdish Freedom Movement, that
Speaker 2: is the casey K, has been able to exist largely
Speaker 2: without the state. This, of course has always been unpopular
Speaker 2: in Anchoror, and he didn't Bagdad. A recent offensive by
Speaker 2: Turkey seek not only to displace the PKK that's the
Speaker 2: Curdistan Workers Party which is part of the k c
Speaker 2: K and its allies from the mountains, but also to
Speaker 2: extend their state control there. Now, I could go on
Speaker 2: f on a diversion about James Scott here, but that's
Speaker 2: another episode that I'm working on, so I'll spare you Instead.
Speaker 2: I asked Mohammed Hamasila, a Kurdish historian, to explain the
Speaker 2: impact of this latest round of aggression and how local
Speaker 2: people felt about it.
Speaker 5: People here in Samni, in the p K controlled area
Speaker 5: or even in Kulasan, our sympathy with PK sympathy with
Speaker 5: the sympathy so they see the really extra struggle against
Speaker 5: an enemy went to invent the whole son went to
Speaker 5: move the want to burn the vocal stand is in
Speaker 5: my point of view, it's it's not that the case
Speaker 5: of of peak of and there are there they have
Speaker 5: the same issue on the same stand with with with
Speaker 5: with the with the Sirian part of Augustan.
Speaker 6: People here. So I'm especially in getting one or not
Speaker 6: the pewty control. I think that.
Speaker 5: With the with the struggle of Java, the struggle of
Speaker 5: of and they did very issue for for for their
Speaker 5: people and they have actually very concrete program for for
Speaker 5: the future.
Speaker 2: Turkey, however, seeing the existence of the movement as a
Speaker 2: threat to its national security, has begun a campaign to
Speaker 2: eliminate the movement wherever it finds it. As Muhammad mentioned,
Speaker 2: the history of the Kurdish people in Turkey is one
Speaker 2: that's riddled with state of violence, and it's that which
Speaker 2: I want to discuss today. Turkey has long vacillated between
Speaker 2: a genocidal denial of the existence of Kurdish people, recognizing
Speaker 2: that they exist only in so far as it allows
Speaker 2: them to be targets for bombing. We could really start
Speaker 2: this history almost anywhere in the twentieth century. Indeed, following
Speaker 2: a series of suppressed rebellions, the entirety of northern Kurdistan
Speaker 2: was closed military area in which Turkey did not allow
Speaker 2: foreigners from nineteen twenty five to nineteen sixty five. But
Speaker 2: I want to start it just after a coup in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty, when Abdullah Oujelen had recently founded the PKK
Speaker 2: or Kurdistan Workers' Party and was beginning to view a
Speaker 2: vision of Kurdish liberation that was rooted in a Marxist,
Speaker 2: Leninist and socialist analysis and ideas of national liberation. Soon
Speaker 2: after the nineteen eighty coup, Turkey began to refer to
Speaker 2: the Kurds as Mountain Turks, and although it doesn't do
Speaker 2: this as much anymore, it did recently release school books
Speaker 2: in the Aarbacere, a majority Kurdish region, that made no
Speaker 2: reference to the Kurds or their language, and asserted that
Speaker 2: people that spoke a dialect of Turkish don't they speak Kurdish.
Speaker 2: It's this denial of their very existence. Zagrest told me
Speaker 2: that made the Kurdish Freedom Guerrillas take up arms in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty four, which is actually forty years ago. Yesterday,
Speaker 2: you were listening to this on the day it comes out.
Speaker 4: But after the military of nineteen eighty and the inhumane
Speaker 4: tortures in the notorious prison of the Arbaker Armed City,
Speaker 4: the movement embarked on a strategy of legitimate self defense,
Speaker 4: on which the military struggle against the Turkish state starting
Speaker 4: from fifteen of August nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2: Four, Since then, there have been periods of ceasefire and
Speaker 2: periods of conflict, with tens of thousands of lives lost.
Speaker 2: Both sides have killed civilians as part of their attacks
Speaker 2: on the other. The most recentcies fire was signed twenty thirteen,
Speaker 2: and as a result, the PKK began slowly withdrawing to
Speaker 2: the mountains of Iraqi, Kurdistan. In twenty fifteen, when the
Speaker 2: Syrian Kurdish YPG and YPGA fighters were leading the battle
Speaker 2: against ISIS, Turkey broke the ceasefire between the PKK and
Speaker 2: itself began attacking the Kurdish fighters, forcing them into a
Speaker 2: war on two fronts. As far as Turkey is concerned,
Speaker 2: the YPG, YPJ, KCK, YBS in Azed Areas and all
Speaker 2: other elements of the Kurdistan Freedom Movement are just different
Speaker 2: names for the PKK, which it considers to be a
Speaker 2: terrorist organization. Everyday life for Kurdish people in Turkey can
Speaker 2: be hard. I've spoken to hundreds, if not thousands of
Speaker 2: them in the last year, often sitting around fires in
Speaker 2: the mountains, working together to build wooden shelters for their children,
Speaker 2: or sharing the balls of beans at my friends curt
Speaker 2: Because the state refused to feed the people it was
Speaker 2: detaining in the open air for days. These aren't conversations
Speaker 2: I recorded, because that wouldn't be safe. There's a very
Speaker 2: real danger of these folks not getting asylum and being
Speaker 2: sent back to a country where they've seen their friends murdered,
Speaker 2: their election results denied, their job applications thrown away, and
Speaker 2: their language suppressed. Having them on the record would be
Speaker 2: a huge risk to their safety. And not every interaction
Speaker 2: I have with people, even people I'm writing about, has
Speaker 2: to we turned into content to go between the adverts.
Speaker 2: So sometimes I just do things because I like to
Speaker 2: do them. If you'd like to know more about these stories,
Speaker 2: you could find a link to a piece I wrote
Speaker 2: for the Kurdish piece ins due in the show notes. Anyway,
Speaker 2: here's an ad break. The situation in Iraq is different.
Speaker 2: The Kurtis do An Aotomina's region enjoys a great degree
Speaker 2: of autonomy from Baghdad. They're chiefly run by two parties,
Speaker 2: the KDP and the p UK. The KDP enjoys influence
Speaker 2: in Abil Or how Lay and Kurdish in Slomania. The
Speaker 2: p UK is in control in these areas, especially those
Speaker 2: of the KDP. A more neoliberal vision of Kurdish identity
Speaker 2: is pursued, and how lahis or skyscrapers lid up all
Speaker 2: night huge mansions, but also the whole areas of the
Speaker 2: city struggling to get by or sometimes not even having
Speaker 2: active cee around water. The vision of Kurdish identity here
Speaker 2: is not a threatening to Turkey, and the KDP seems
Speaker 2: to take the line that the PKK or to keep
Speaker 2: its struggle within the Turkish borders. The PUK has been
Speaker 2: more sympathetic to the KCK. The PKK. It's often in
Speaker 2: the mountains near Slomanian du Hok that Turkey targets Kurdish
Speaker 2: guerrillas and their infrastructure. For the last forty years, Turkey
Speaker 2: has remained extremely hostile to division of Kurdish liberation, with
Speaker 2: the democratic and federal system that Ojerland and the movement
Speaker 2: that follows him have adopted. I asked Zagros to explain
Speaker 2: the connection between the Kurdish struggling North and East Syria,
Speaker 2: which may listens will probably be familiar with, and the
Speaker 2: element to the Kurdish freedom movement in other parts of
Speaker 2: Kurdistan which they might not be familiar with. And I'll
Speaker 2: ask interview I spoke to Zagros about history in Spain.
Speaker 2: Now it's history. To give me a history lesson. By
Speaker 2: the way, he calls the Oderland leader appo here rab
Speaker 2: apple in Kurdish. It's a common contraction that's used all
Speaker 2: over Kurdistan, and apple is also the evocative form of
Speaker 2: the Comanche word for a paternal uncle.
Speaker 4: A leader uncle migrated to the Middle East. He migrated
Speaker 4: to Syria and Lebanon. I mean months before the military
Speaker 4: coup in Turkey, in the military coup of nineteen eighty.
Speaker 4: He went there on his own. There was only one
Speaker 4: comrade with him. First he entered the city of Kogani
Speaker 4: and from the he found his way to Lebanon, to Beirut.
Speaker 4: In Lebanon, he made relations with the Palatinian groups. He
Speaker 4: even took part in the resistance of the Palatinian groups
Speaker 4: against the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. For nearly twenty years,
Speaker 4: he waged the freedom of struggle from Lebanon and Syria.
Speaker 4: In doing so, he educated, he trained, and organized the
Speaker 4: Kurdish people in Rajawa, Kerkistan.
Speaker 3: In this sense, his struggle is twofold.
Speaker 4: First day he developed self awareness in the people of
Speaker 4: Rajawa with regard to the natural and cultural identity, and
Speaker 4: brought the Rajawa people together, who had been divided by
Speaker 4: the many Arab builts and demographic change operations of the
Speaker 4: bath regime. All these organizational activities were done despite the
Speaker 4: Sydian regime, and he managed to run a delicate balance
Speaker 4: to foil the repressive measures of the Syrian regime.
Speaker 2: There I'll just interject here to explain these terms. Bathis
Speaker 2: Syria and Hafizala said and his son bashirol A said,
Speaker 2: attempted to divide and deny the existence of the Kurdish
Speaker 2: people in many ways. Some of these included omitting them
Speaker 2: from censuses, denying them citizenship, prohibiting the public use of
Speaker 2: their language and demographic transfers, and installed belts of Arab
Speaker 2: people in areas that were majority Kurdish. Nonetheless, a Sid
Speaker 2: also saw benefit allowing the PKK to exist within his borders,
Speaker 2: especially in the parts of Lebanon that Syria occupied, in
Speaker 2: order to use them as a tool against other states.
Speaker 4: Secondly, he got this nationally and culturally aware people of
Speaker 4: Rajava to support the struggle in North Kordistan.
Speaker 3: Therefore, thousands of Rojava.
Speaker 4: You were first organized and educated in villages in cities,
Speaker 4: and then they joined the Gerula struggle and fought in
Speaker 4: North Kodestan in Baku Karalistan. There's a struggle served to
Speaker 4: unite Rajawa and North Koralistan Baku Karalistan and developed shared
Speaker 4: national political awareness and attitudes. Thousands of Rajawa youth boys
Speaker 4: and girls film martyr in the ranks of the Gerula Struggle.
Speaker 4: Leader Appo tried to reach out to all cities, to
Speaker 4: all villages, to all families, and even to all individuals
Speaker 4: in Rojawa Kalistan. This has created a strong national, social, cultural,
Speaker 4: and let's say a philosophical point between Leader Apple and
Speaker 4: the Rajava people because a neglected and divided people had
Speaker 4: united around him.
Speaker 2: This isn't an episode about the entire history of the PKK.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't be the person to write that, but I
Speaker 2: will attempt to speed run it here anyway. Upper was
Speaker 2: arrested in Arabia in nineteen ninety nine. Ever since then
Speaker 2: he's been held in prison, often without access to visitors
Speaker 2: or his lawyers, and at some points on an island
Speaker 2: where he was a solitary prisoner surrounded by hundreds if
Speaker 2: not thousands of guards. His human rights are almost universal
Speaker 2: knowledge to have been violated by this arrangement, and despite
Speaker 2: a quarter century of detention and Turkish moves towards Europe,
Speaker 2: there seems to be no willingness on a part of
Speaker 2: the Turkish state to release him. In his time in jail,
Speaker 2: he began to read more and correspond with many thinkers,
Speaker 2: including Murray Bookchin. Buukchin influenced his sinking a great deal,
Speaker 2: and gradually, through this and other influences, Osla moved away
Speaker 2: from a Marxist Leninist analysis and national liberation goals and
Speaker 2: instead began to conceive feminist and ecological revolution that decentralized power,
Speaker 2: ensured all authority positions were shared by a man and
Speaker 2: a woman, and valued the environment as much or more
Speaker 2: than the economy. This libertarian left ideology came to be
Speaker 2: known as democratic confederalism, and it is a guiding ethos
Speaker 2: for Java and indeed the Casey Care as a whole.
Speaker 2: The civil war in Syria provided an opening that the
Speaker 2: Kurdistan Freedom movement took advantage of as ASAD forces withdrew
Speaker 2: from their regions to fight elsewhere, didn't spring from the
Speaker 2: ground in twenty eleven, but instead they'd spent decades building
Speaker 2: a movement that they felt could replace the state. Today,
Speaker 2: millions of people live, work and play under democratic confederist
Speaker 2: ideology in the Autonomous Area of North and East Syria,
Speaker 2: where it was last year. It's not paradise, but it's
Speaker 2: a special place, and by any metric, life there is
Speaker 2: better than in the rest of Syria. Right now. For
Speaker 2: over a decade, they've navigated a complex system of adversaries,
Speaker 2: including the Syrian State, the Islamic State, and the Turkish State.
Speaker 2: Just this week, all three of them have tried to
Speaker 2: attack Rajava. More than fifteen thousand people men and women
Speaker 2: have died in the decade long war against the Islamic State,
Speaker 2: which country to much reporting, remained ongoing. It is actually
Speaker 2: car bombed a place not far from where I stayed
Speaker 2: last October after i'd come home. At times, the USA
Speaker 2: has supported the people of Javre in their battle against
Speaker 2: Islamic State, but it's also stood by as Turkish bombs
Speaker 2: fell on them. But though ra Java is by far
Speaker 2: the biggest territorial area which to democratic confederalism is in practice,
Speaker 2: much as a movement remains in the mountains of southern
Speaker 2: Kurdistan in what is technically Iraqi territory. There are many
Speaker 2: more Kurdish people in Turkey, and as a recent election
Speaker 2: results show, revolution by the ballot box is not really
Speaker 2: an option for them. Javre enjoys autonomy, but it's still
Speaker 2: very much ideologically twinned with the part of the movement
Speaker 2: that remains in the mountains and dedicated to its struggle
Speaker 2: against the Turkish state. Turkey, in return, has crossed the
Speaker 2: border with Iraq to attack the KCK and anyone else
Speaker 2: who gets caught in the crossfire. As Nagros explained, this
Speaker 2: is not new, but the recent change has been notable well.
Speaker 4: During the eighties, nineties and even after two thousand, the
Speaker 4: Turkish Army used to do military operations to the other
Speaker 4: side of the border into the Iraqi border for several months,
Speaker 4: to a draw back to the other side of the
Speaker 4: border to its own border afterwards after several months, and
Speaker 4: in that period it only had limited number of barracks
Speaker 4: and bases in.
Speaker 3: The Iraqi and the Iraqi territory.
Speaker 4: The change now is that Teki has built a new
Speaker 4: military roads from Scratch to the Credit Sand region to
Speaker 4: northern Iraq. It has built more than one hundred big
Speaker 4: and small military bases and barracks in the area and
Speaker 4: has no intention to withdraw. As I said, the ultimate
Speaker 4: goal is to is to annex all these lands to
Speaker 4: the Turkish territory.
Speaker 2: Today, Turkish troops can be found deep inside Iraq. According
Speaker 2: to the Community Peacemaker Teams, since December of twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: Turkish forces have built over forty bases anywhere from nine
Speaker 2: to twenty five kilometers into Iraqi, Kurdistan's territory south of
Speaker 2: its border end quote. They have dispatched hundreds of troops
Speaker 2: and military vehicles into another state, set up checkpoints, and
Speaker 2: even killed civilians a member of the Kig's military. The
Speaker 2: Peshmerga fighting has caused massive wildfires. For example, in Sagale Village,
Speaker 2: about fifty five percent of the agricultural land has been
Speaker 2: burned by Turkish attacks. Incidentally, Turkish shelling in the Autonomous
Speaker 2: Area of North and East Syria has also caused similar
Speaker 2: fires and destruction of crops in agricultural areas. The Kurdish
Speaker 2: Freedom movement is very well established in the mountains of
Speaker 2: southern Kurdistan, where they live in tunnels and caves. These
Speaker 2: are not caves of tunnels like you played in a
Speaker 2: little child. We're talking about villages underground. This makes tracking
Speaker 2: them very hard. As we heard another episode, many of
Speaker 2: the fighters said to Curtis down as Syrian Arabs repurposed
Speaker 2: by Turkey and gind up an anti Kurdish sentiment. But
Speaker 2: this is perhaps the least concerning of the way the
Speaker 2: tunnels are being attacked. Zagros explained some of the other
Speaker 2: things that they've seen.
Speaker 3: Data is that they use dogs.
Speaker 4: They tie explosives to the dogs and send the dogs
Speaker 4: into the tunnels and they explode the dogs wire remote control.
Speaker 2: In addition to the dogs, he says that the Turkey
Speaker 2: state uses chemical weapons inside the tunnels. There are also
Speaker 2: reports of suicide bombers definating themselves. The KTK also claims
Speaker 2: the Turkey uses thermobaric bombs sometimes called bunker busters, which
Speaker 2: create a huge pressure wave from subsequent vacuum.
Speaker 4: Also, they are using thermobodic bombs. We have documented the
Speaker 4: use of these thermobodic bombs. There are remnants of these bombs.
Speaker 4: They are using theemobodic or vacuum bombs against the tunnels,
Speaker 4: and they are using some form of explosives which are
Speaker 4: more powerful than thermobolic bombs. Got some freedom grillas have
Speaker 4: developed literature for it because they do know what kind
Speaker 4: of explosively did. But it has the effect of a
Speaker 4: nuclear bomb. We got some freedom grilla called nuclear bomb.
Speaker 4: They call it so because the effects are high, are
Speaker 4: higher than the thermobotic bombs.
Speaker 2: I asked Mohammed to explain how people reacting to the
Speaker 2: current situation.
Speaker 6: You know, you know invted some parts of you could
Speaker 6: understand that.
Speaker 5: Actually the the areas under the control or under the
Speaker 5: influence of character instead of KDP, and you know that
Speaker 5: people here have dislikes.
Speaker 6: This issue is like the version of Turkey to this area.
Speaker 5: It's not just in boss telling people besides the pia
Speaker 5: k elements and telling people and building the whole agricultural
Speaker 5: area and you know, so and so on.
Speaker 6: So it's kind of an inversion.
Speaker 5: And but here some people on forces in in the
Speaker 5: southern part of Kurdusan Orstan, you know, Iraqi Puldustan like
Speaker 5: the sympathy with the Picak sympathy, Okay, as they see.
Speaker 6: That they're live.
Speaker 5: So they're struggling against Turkey because if there is no
Speaker 5: Bika gay even there is no Biga Gay. The Turkish
Speaker 5: forces woll will not withdraw from Kutsa when it controlled
Speaker 5: any area of Iraqi kumsant to be saved or southern
Speaker 5: it will not withdraw and it's it's excuses Pika k
Speaker 5: But things on Earth is telling something else.
Speaker 2: Despite what both my guests have seen as alien nation
Speaker 2: of the local population, Turkey's continuing with its attacks. I
Speaker 2: asked Sagres, what do you thought the goals of this
Speaker 2: Turkish invasion of Iraqua.
Speaker 4: The invasion and annexation of these lands is the prime
Speaker 4: goal of Turkey. This goal is a long term goal
Speaker 4: of the Turkish state since it has been created after
Speaker 4: the Luzan Agreement. It has two aspects. Firstly, Turkey lays
Speaker 4: claimed to what was once part of the Ottoman Empire
Speaker 4: one hundred years ago. Lays claims to the cities like
Speaker 4: Mussil and Kirkuk and claims that these these are lends
Speaker 4: of Turkey. So the invasion operation in the area of
Speaker 4: Batina is up in Matina and Avashin. In the areas
Speaker 4: around the cities of Armedia, Dere, Lucei, Laze and Hu
Speaker 4: they are at ten to take control of these mountainous
Speaker 4: areas and to materialize those long range goals. Turkey already
Speaker 4: has a has a big military base near Musil, I
Speaker 4: think fifteen to twenty kilometers in northern Musil. It is
Speaker 4: called the Bashika Base. So if Teki manages to invade
Speaker 4: all these areas in Badina I mean in the cities
Speaker 4: of the Hook mountainous areas of the Hook, Turkey would
Speaker 4: be able to create a land bridge between these areas
Speaker 4: and its base in Musil, and it will be far
Speaker 4: easier for Turkey to let's say an ex city of
Speaker 4: Muslim and Kirkuktu its lands. Secondly, Turkey has a long
Speaker 4: term goal of demographic demographic change in Kurdista. As you know,
Speaker 4: Yakistan is a land, the ancestral land of the Kurts,
Speaker 4: being divided between four countries Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria
Speaker 4: being divided by borders. People from one side of the
Speaker 4: border are Kurdish, put on the other side of the
Speaker 4: the Arkurdish. In many cases, the borderline go through the city.
Speaker 4: They divide the cities, they have divided the villages. They
Speaker 4: have divided in the tribes. They have divided large populations.
Speaker 4: They have even divided families. This is one of the
Speaker 4: characteristics of the border in Kurdistan.
Speaker 2: In fact, Turkey has begun something of an Arab belt
Speaker 2: program who is owned in Syria, seeking to resettle Syrian refugees.
Speaker 2: Turkish backs Syrian anti government rebels in the areas that
Speaker 2: it took from Java in military operations over the last
Speaker 2: eight years. This is part of Turkey's plan to return
Speaker 2: as many as a million Syrian migrants to a country
Speaker 2: stood in the grips of a brutal civil war, and
Speaker 2: push the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria back
Speaker 2: from the Turkish borders crush it altogether. For Turkey, there's
Speaker 2: no distinction between Ajava and the PKK, and thus Turkey
Speaker 2: claims the entirety of a Java is a haven for terrorism.
Speaker 2: Many Kurdish fighters and international volunteers who fought Isis for
Speaker 2: years died fighting the Turkish army in a free and
Speaker 2: and the many other territories the Turkey has expanded into
Speaker 2: since twenty seventeen. The fighting there was fierce and saw
Speaker 2: the YPG and the WIPG, the Men's and Women's armed
Speaker 2: forces of Java battling a NATO army with modern armor
Speaker 2: and modern airpower. After taking significant losses. They retreated and
Speaker 2: I asked Sagros what this means for people living in
Speaker 2: a free who had just managed to return to some
Speaker 2: semblance of normalcy after Assad's forces left and attacks from
Speaker 2: me on Nusfra front became less frequent.
Speaker 3: This is genocide.
Speaker 4: I'm in forcing people to leave their lands and replacing
Speaker 4: those people with people which are not from that land.
Speaker 4: Forcing people to leave the ancestral land and then with
Speaker 4: they have lived on for thousands of years, for more
Speaker 4: than ten thousand years, and getting Arab jihades Chechen Jihadis
Speaker 4: to live in those areas. It is a genocide along
Speaker 4: with the ecocide which is now taking place. Thousands of
Speaker 4: hectares of forests of agricultural land are now burning. So
Speaker 4: what Turkey does is femicide, is ecoside, is genocide in Kurdistan.
Speaker 3: And this let's say, what now happens to the curse.
Speaker 4: It's the same thing that happened to the Armenians one
Speaker 4: thousand years ago. The genocide of the Armenians was done
Speaker 4: by the people who had the same mentality and the
Speaker 4: same mindset of Arguona. I can say, so these areas
Speaker 4: are very strategic for the curves. They bind the four
Speaker 4: parts of Kurdistan together demographically, and now Arduwan wants to
Speaker 4: draw a Jihads buffer result between these.
Speaker 3: Areas.
Speaker 4: If occurred from Syria wants to go to the Kurdistan
Speaker 4: in under the invasion of Turkey, we call it North Kurdistan.
Speaker 4: He will have to go through cities and areas populated
Speaker 4: by Arab jihadists, by church and jihadists by Kirkman jihadists
Speaker 4: by jihadis have been which have been collected from around
Speaker 4: the world. So this buffer zone, which is more than
Speaker 4: one thousand kilometers long according to Ardua's plan and thirty
Speaker 4: to forty kilometers wide, is expected to be inhabited, to
Speaker 4: be settled by the jihadis which Ardoan has gathered from
Speaker 4: x DASH members, ex NSA members, x al Qaeda.
Speaker 2: At present, it's Turkish occupation. It's a situation in parts
Speaker 2: of Syria, but it's also increasingly becoming likely it will
Speaker 2: be the situation in parts of Rock. That is often
Speaker 2: the case, say to trying to use divisions in Kurdistan
Speaker 2: to their advantage, and Turkey in particular is relying on
Speaker 2: the well worn excuse of counter terrorism to mount its
Speaker 2: incursions deep into a rock. Here's Mohammed explaining.
Speaker 5: That Piker is thinking like in such a way to
Speaker 5: support to support maybe pick again. They don't say orally
Speaker 5: that that thing. And KDP says that follow the instruction
Speaker 5: of Turkey and actually here the force and influence of
Speaker 5: Turky and even I ran in the Putick controlled area
Speaker 5: is UH is very strong. And people here as people
Speaker 5: of the nation, I'm not feeling comfort with such impasion,
Speaker 5: such issues. So we are lot like the owner of
Speaker 5: our right decision in the area. So we're divided within
Speaker 5: ira Iran and Turkey and so on, so and we
Speaker 5: are not depending on our people. You know, thousands of
Speaker 5: people killed for the nation analysis you know, hopes and now.
Speaker 6: People are.
Speaker 5: Frustrate with such such issues, with such situation.
Speaker 2: Mahmad also said that was really frustrating for him to
Speaker 2: see Curish politicians so influenced by the states that they've
Speaker 2: been trying to escape for a century.
Speaker 5: So we are here in a situation from the north,
Speaker 5: Turkey from the east, Iran from the south, and all
Speaker 5: are they working that the people who pay thousands thousands
Speaker 5: of of of you know martyrs south and so of UH,
Speaker 5: you know, loss of the people.
Speaker 6: Why you are not depending on.
Speaker 5: Your will or the force of your people, why you
Speaker 5: are became like like a feather, a feather to the
Speaker 5: to the windsor of.
Speaker 6: So forth, which are not you're they're not your friends.
Speaker 5: Even in the east, in the north and the south,
Speaker 5: there are not new But if you depend on your
Speaker 5: own people, on your own to struggle hard, and we
Speaker 5: have you know, we have the.
Speaker 6: Legacy of this issue.
Speaker 5: We have the legacy of struggle in this area from
Speaker 5: nineteen six.
Speaker 2: This is indeed, the evasion of southern Kurdistan would not
Speaker 2: be possible without the consent of both the Iraqi and
Speaker 2: Kurdistan regional authorities, so gross mentioned. Turkish president reship type
Speaker 2: Duwe visited Baghdad on April to twenty second. This was
Speaker 2: his first visit to Iraq since twenty eleven. During the visit,
Speaker 2: iraqan Turkey side the Joint Security Agreement allowing Turkey to
Speaker 2: conduct military operations deep within Iraqi territory. In return, Iraqi
Speaker 2: received desperately needed water from Turkey.
Speaker 4: And now in those areas tens of thousands of Turkish troops,
Speaker 4: hundreds of tanks, armored vehicles, drones.
Speaker 3: Brothers have been deploved to the area.
Speaker 4: They are active every day, and they are invading northern
Speaker 4: Iraq at a time when the border guards of Iraqi
Speaker 4: Iraqi Army border guards are standing by and just watching.
Speaker 3: As you may know, as.
Speaker 4: The result of the agreement between the Iraqi State and
Speaker 4: Turky State, the Iraqi border guard forces, let's say they
Speaker 4: were decided to be sent to the Iraqi Turkish border.
Speaker 4: But now these border guards are not on the Turkish
Speaker 4: Iraqi border, the border that we now these border guards
Speaker 4: have been deployed forty kilometers thirty kilometers deep into the
Speaker 4: Iraqi territory. They don't go to the border. They are
Speaker 4: guarding the invading Turkish Army.
Speaker 2: For the people of the region, this means yet more
Speaker 2: trauma and more displacement. They were already more than one
Speaker 2: million displaced people in southern Kurkistan. Some of them are
Speaker 2: living in pretty terrible conditions. I've seen those refugee camps
Speaker 2: when I was there last October. But these operations have
Speaker 2: created more. Here's just one anecdote to displacement shared by
Speaker 2: CPT on their website.
Speaker 7: We met a man named Kakbashir who had tried to
Speaker 7: build a cafe here, his dreams of a cafe had
Speaker 7: been shattered by Turkish artillery and smaller arms fire coming
Speaker 7: from the Turkish base on the hillside nearby. He was
Speaker 7: originally from Segurae village, but had been displaced to Ghani
Speaker 7: Village by the Turkish military five years ago due to
Speaker 7: the loss of his farm in Seguday. He has planted
Speaker 7: some vegetables next to the side of his cafe. He
Speaker 7: gave each CPT member some sweet basil and invited us
Speaker 7: to his village. When we arrived, a man dressed in
Speaker 7: immaculate traditional Kurdish clothes stood transfixed staring into the valley.
Speaker 7: He was staring at Mejia Village, his home. Mijia is
Speaker 7: one of at least nine villages displaced by the recent
Speaker 7: Turkish operation. Kakbashir told us that displaced people from the
Speaker 7: valley would visit this place daily to gaze upon their
Speaker 7: cut off towns and farmland below.
Speaker 2: Despite months of shalling and bombing, the military stronghold to
Speaker 2: the Kadistan Freedom Movement remained intact, and the more obvious
Speaker 2: damage he has been done to civilians rather than military targets.
Speaker 2: The hPG, which is the fighting arm of the BKKA
Speaker 2: has been able to obtain loitering antiacraft munitions shut down
Speaker 2: several drones, but it's still unable to shoot down fighter
Speaker 2: jets like the US provided F sixteens to the currently
Speaker 2: bombing them for civilians without mounting caves or tunnels to
Speaker 2: hide in. The impact is severe and people who have
Speaker 2: faced depression and persecution from Saddam Hussein Isis numerous other
Speaker 2: states and groups are now once again being displaced. I
Speaker 2: want to finish up with the end of Zagoro's message
Speaker 2: to me, in which he made a comparison with Palestine,
Speaker 2: like I did at the start on the day of
Speaker 2: thirst Intrude Zagros, bombs made in the US had just
Speaker 2: been falling from Israeli planes on too civilians in Palestine again,
Speaker 2: and we discussed the fact that all the solutions being
Speaker 2: discussed hinged around the need for states, one state or
Speaker 2: two states to solve the problem. But this was a
Speaker 2: problem created by states, and it was states sending bombs
Speaker 2: to another state to drop on children, both in Kurdistan
Speaker 2: and in Palestine.
Speaker 7: There was the problem.
Speaker 2: His Zagos reflection on nearly ten months of bombing in
Speaker 2: Palestine and Kurdistan, I just want to explain here that
Speaker 2: Abubaka Baghdadi was at one point the leader of Isis
Speaker 2: instead now and when he says Dash, he's referring to
Speaker 2: the former so called Islamic state.
Speaker 4: The struggle that is now waged in the mountains of
Speaker 4: Kurdistan against the invading Turkish army. It is a continuation
Speaker 4: of the struggle against Dash in Iraq and Syria, because
Speaker 4: ideologically there is no difference between Ardovan and Abuba Baghdadi.
Speaker 4: Baghdadi first took Musul, and now Ardovan wants to invade
Speaker 4: Mussul too. Ardowan attacks all those places which have been
Speaker 4: hubs of resistance against Dash. He attacks Sinjar, he attacks Kobani,
Speaker 4: He attacks Kandid Mountains, which are the home of those
Speaker 4: who inspired and all organized the fight against the AJ.
Speaker 4: On the ground, Erdogan's army is Dash in native uniforms,
Speaker 4: in native fatigues. In recent days, Arduan accuses Nitenno of
Speaker 4: committing genocide against the Palacinians. Nteno also accuses Erdogan of
Speaker 4: committing genocide against the Curts. In fact, what these two
Speaker 4: men say against each other is to some extent right,
Speaker 4: both of them have been commissioned by the forces of
Speaker 4: capitalist modernity to eliminate two people, to eliminate the Curves
Speaker 4: and the Palacinians. What Nitano does against the Palacinians is
Speaker 4: exactly what Erdogan is doing against the Kurts. What is
Speaker 4: needed is to draw the attention of the world's public
Speaker 4: opinion to the atrocities of Aldogan's regime and the genocidal
Speaker 4: and ecosidal crimes commits against the Kurdish people and their land,
Speaker 4: which is Kurdistan. The struggle in Palestine and Kurdistan are
Speaker 4: one struggle, the struggle of two people against genocide and examination.
Speaker 4: Both struggle needs support from the youth, from the women
Speaker 4: all around the world, from democratic forces, from intellectuals, students, unions, workers,
Speaker 4: from all people. People need to be united against Ardowan,
Speaker 4: as they were united against Dash, as they are now
Speaker 4: united against the genocidal attacks in Palestine. The Turkish regime
Speaker 4: can be protested everywhere in many ways. Turkish goods and
Speaker 4: commodities can be boycotted because they are the source of
Speaker 4: funds for Ardowan's war machine, for Ardowan's genocidal army. Delegations
Speaker 4: can be formed and they can come to visit Kurdistan
Speaker 4: and see with their own eyes the extent of ecosit
Speaker 4: and genocidling to understand. Free journalists can shed more light
Speaker 4: on the atrocities Avardoan in Kurdistan.
Speaker 3: Revolutionary youth, revolutionary.
Speaker 4: People, men and women can come and join the struggle
Speaker 4: in the mountains of Kurdistan, Curd.
Speaker 3: Establish your home.
Speaker 7: It could Happen here as a production of crul Zone Media.
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Speaker 1: You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
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